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		<title>Pride festival &lt;https://y.st./en/weblog/2017/08-August/12.xhtml&gt;</title>
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		<header>
			<h1>Pride festival</h1>
			<p>Day 00889: <time>Saturday, 2017 August 12</time></p>
		</header>
<section id="to-do">
	<h2>To-do list</h2>
	<ul>
		<li>
			Acquire stuff for my new home:
			<ul>
				<li>
					A bed
				</li>
				<li>
					A dustpan
				</li>
				<li>
					A carpet broom
				</li>
			</ul>
		</li>
		<li>
			Inform people that I&apos;ve moved
			<ul>
				<li>
					Relevant online accounts
				</li>
			</ul>
		</li>
		<li>
			Finish stabilizing <a href="https://git.volatile.ch./y.st./include.d/releases">include.d</a> and put out another release (low priority)
		</li>
		<li>
			Clean up my apartment
			<ul>
				<li>
					Clean up the kitchen
				</li>
			</ul>
		</li>
		<li>
			Finish the library&apos;s &quot;bingo&quot; sheet (these tasks were typed verbatim, and include any mistakes and quirks present on the sheet handed to me)
			<ul>
				<li>
					Attend any library program
				</li>
				<li>
					Read a book you found using Novelist. A librarian can help!
				</li>
				<li>
					Read a poem by Oregon Poet Laureate Elizabeth Woody
				</li>
				<li>
					Read a graphic novel
				</li>
				<li>
					<del>Get outside: read in a Willamalane park for one hour willamalane.org</del>
				</li>
				<li>
					Browse the Gale Virtual Reference Library. A librarian can help!
				</li>
				<li>
					Build, draw, or make something based on a book that you read
				</li>
				<li>
					Read a science fiction title
				</li>
				<li>
					Share a book recommendation
				</li>
				<li>
					Read an award-winning book
				</li>
				<li>
					Suggest a library program you would attend
				</li>
				<li>
					Read a new book (published in 2016 or 2017)
				</li>
				<li>
					Read a young adult or children&apos;s book
				</li>
				<li>
					Read something funny and have a good laugh :)
				</li>
				<li>
					Look at the art in the City Hall Gallery. There&apos;s a new show every month!
				</li>
				<li>
					Volunteer for a couple hours at a community organization of your choice.
				</li>
				<li>
					Download one of the library&apos;s free apps or search in a database. A librarian can help!
				</li>
				<li>
					Read a book that takes place in another country
				</li>
			</ul>
		</li>
	</ul>
</section>
<section id="general">
	<h2>General news</h2>
	<p>
		I tried to take a shortcut to the pride festival.
		My intent was to find that strange dead-end with the through route that only pedestrians and cyclists can take.
		Instead, I found that the point in which I turn off of the bike path is not where I&apos;m supposed to turn.
		The path seems to be a part of Alton Baker Park.
		Had I been keeping to the path instead of turning away, I&apos;d&apos;ve had an easy route to Eugene all along.
	</p>
	<p>
		At the festival, I found there wasn&apos;t really a good way to meet people.
		I could walk up to random strangers and introduce myself, but that&apos;d be awkward.
		<em>(I should&apos;ve known a festival wasn&apos;t a good way to meet anyone.
		What was I even thinking?)</em>
	</p>
	<p>
		All day during the festivities, a drag show was going on.
		The intro was fun; two of the drag queens exchanged playful banter as they made some announcements and acknowledged the festival&apos;s sponsors.
		The singing after the intro though wasn&apos;t my thing.
		Maybe I would&apos;ve gotten into it more if they were singing free music, but maybe not; I&apos;m not really into live performances.
	</p>
	<p>
		I noticed a former classmate, but it was one that tried to avoid me in Winco the other day, so I ignored them today.
		Clearly, they want nothing to do with me for some reason.
		I also ran into a former coworker, so we hung out for a while.
		It turns out they&apos;re bisexual.
		<em>(Why is it that every queer person I know in person is bisexual?
		What do they have in me that I don&apos;t?
		If being bi is so common, why can&apos;t I be bi!?)</em>
		After a while, I decided to leave them to check out other stands.
		It was my first time at the festival, and I wanted to see what else was there.
		After checking out all the stands in a short amount of time though, I quickly grew bored, then lonely.
		<em>(Why did I leave the only company I had!?
		That was so stupid and short-sighted.)</em>
		I didn&apos;t see them again, though I did look.
	</p>
	<p>
		There was a flag vendor with various queerfolk flags, but none were quite what I was after.
		I guess maybe I should&apos;ve gone with an agender flag, but my agenderism is more of an internal thing.
		It doesn&apos;t require the approval, validation, support, or recognition of others.
		At least in my case.
		While I think being agendered is more central to who I am, I make my gayness more central to my outward identification.
		If I am to make being gay work, I&apos;m going to need to find a boyfriend, and that requires people knowing I&apos;m gay.
		The gay flags available weren&apos;t to my liking though.
		Some were the standard rainbow ones.
		There&apos;s nothing wrong with those, but there&apos;s no point in my buying one; I&apos;ve already got one.
		The lesbian gay flags obviously don&apos;t work for me either.
		I don&apos;t have a female body and I&apos;m not seeking a female partner.
		The gay male flags weren&apos;t great though.
		They were incredibly reminiscent of United States flags.
		The rainbow stripes took the place of the red and white stripes, and the interlocked male symbols took the plage of the stars.
		I don&apos;t like this country though; I don&apos;t want a flag that make it look like I do.
	</p>
	<p>
		There was a rock-paining stand set up, but I couldn&apos;t for the life of me come up with what to paint, so I abstained.
		After leaving though, I realised I should&apos;ve gone with stripes in the colours of the agender flag with interlocked male symbols in the middle.
		Next time maybe, next time.
	</p>
	<p>
		I saw a gratis <abbr title="human immunodeficiency virus">HIV</abbr> test booth set up, but I ignored it at first.
		I&apos;m a drug-free virgin; I know I don&apos;t have <abbr title="human immunodeficiency virus">HIV</abbr>, so I don&apos;t need to be tested.
		Walking by again later, I saw they were giving out tee-shirts to people that got tested though.
		One of the two designs was of a rainbow heart; not a heart shape, but the vital organ.
		I had to have one.
		The testing was interesting.
		First, they asked me several questions about myself.
		On thing they asked for was my current gender.
		It was interesting that they&apos;d ask that; I&apos;ve never had a health professional do that.
		At the time, I thought it was cool of them to ask.
		Now that I&apos;m home though, I sort of wonder how my gender was related to anything.
		After that, they asked for my sex at birth.
		So ... if I&apos;d had sex-change surgery, that wouldn&apos;t&apos;ve changed anything for their question; they wanted to know what my <abbr title="deoxyribonucleic acid">DNA</abbr> said I was.
		They also asked the sex of my sexual partners.
		At first, I said male, but then clarified that I&apos;m still a virgin, but my sexual partners one day would be male.
		It turns out that&apos;s not good, from an <abbr title="human immunodeficiency virus">HIV</abbr> standpoint.
		Male/male sex is more likely to transmit <abbr title="human immunodeficiency virus">HIV</abbr> than any other pairing.
		I asked why that is, and it&apos;s because of anal sex.
		The inside of the bowels is fragile and weak.
		It easily tears, resulting in bleeding and an open wound; a perfect opportunity for <abbr title="human immunodeficiency virus">HIV</abbr> to spread.
		<em>(Joy.
		Just because I&apos;m a gay male, I&apos;ve got an increased chance of catching <abbr title="human immunodeficiency virus">HIV</abbr>.
		It&apos;s not fair.
		I don&apos;t even <strong>*want*</strong> to be gay.
		Why can&apos;t I be bi!?
		If I were bi, I&apos;d probably end up with a female partner, just because most people are heterosexual.
		The probability of finding someone I like that likes me back would be higher for a heterosexual pairing.
		And why does anal sex have to be the one sexual thing I crave?
		Again, it just isn&apos;t fair.
		I&apos;m the type to dedicate myself to a single partner.
		However, if my partner cheats on me, they&apos;ll put me at extreme risk.)</em>
		Of course, the test came back negative as I knew it would, and they gave me a card as evidence.
		I guess these cards are how you prove to a potential sexual partner that you&apos;ve been tested recently and that the result was negative.
		If I reach the sexual stage of a relationship, I guess these cards are how I&apos;ll probably get my partner to prove his cleanliness and how I&apos;ll prove mine.
		That said, you&apos;ve got to have <abbr title="human immunodeficiency virus">HIV</abbr> for three months before it&apos;ll show up on this test.
	</p>
	<p>
		It seems while I no longer blame myself for what I am or expect myself to change, I still mourn what I am at times.
		I guess it can&apos;t be helped.
		I don&apos;t own anyone my sexuality, but that doesn&apos;t mean that the sexuality I have is one I can be happy with.
		The world is a terrible place, and the road ahead of me is long and difficult.
		I keep trying to tell myself it&apos;s better this way, but I&apos;m not sure I&apos;m buying it.
		If I were female, perhaps things would be easier.
		Then again, maybe they wouldn&apos;t.
		However, as a male, there&apos;s basically two options, sexually.
		There&apos;s male/male sex and female/male sex.
		Which one poses the more unacceptable risk, as a male?
		I keep trying to tell myself the female/male sex is the worse risk.
		If something goes wrong, the female could get pregnant.
		And because I&apos;m the male in that equation, not the female, I can&apos;t ensure that there&apos;s an abortion.
		If there&apos;s a mistake, an error, I could cause a baby to be brought into the world, and the world&apos;s already overpopulated.
		I can&apos;t have that.
		With male/male sex, the risk isn&apos;t on the world, but on me.
		In a best-case scenario, I find a loving partner and nothing goes wrong.
		But if something goes wrong, I get <abbr title="human immunodeficiency virus">HIV</abbr>.
		At that point, I have two choices.
		First, I can abstain from sex forever.
		I cannot risk passing it on.
		I&apos;ve always thought that the key to stopping the spread of <abbr title="human immunodeficiency virus">HIV</abbr> is for those that have it to do whatever it takes to stop spreading it.
		They&apos;d condemn themselves to solitude, but their solitude would do the world a great service; the world could finally be free of this terrible and uncurable disease.
		It would take all of them doing it though to wipe it out completely.
		I couldn&apos;t do it all, but I could do my part.
		Second, I could kill myself.
		I might do that out of devastation.
		Or I might not.
		I have a tendency to plan out worst-case scenarios, so I can&apos;t help but go somewhere so dark.
		Why can&apos;t I be ace though?
		Why can&apos;t I be free of this terrible risk?
	</p>
	<p>
		The festival left me feeling kind of bad.
		It would&apos;ve been a lot more fun with a boyfriend to hang out with.
		There wasn&apos;t really much point in coming alone.
		It was important that I come though.
		I needed to know what the festival was like.
		If I come again, I should probably rainbow up my wardrobe for the occasion.
		I&apos;m thinking perhaps I should get one of the more-colourful Floraverse tee-shirts to wear.
		That said, if I don&apos;t have a partner by then, and I probably won&apos;t, it might be a better idea to volunteer.
		I&apos;d meet a lot more people that way, that&apos;s for sure, and I&apos;d be a lot less bored and lonely.
		It gave me hope in a way though.
		There were so many people there.
		Many of them probably weren&apos;t queerfolk like myself.
		For example, my former coworker&apos;s child was there, as she came with my queer, former coworker.
		There were probably loads of people there with someone.
		Even if half the people weren&apos;t queer though, there were still a lot of queerfolk.
		Of course, not everyone that&apos;s queer is a gay male, so that cuts down the dating pool further, but there are people around.
		I think.
		Admittedly, many of these people might&apos;ve been from out of town.
	</p>
	<p>
		When I went to leave, I found my back bike tire was perfectly flat.
		At first, I thought some hater&apos;d come by and slashed it.
		I mean, if you hate queerfolk, it&apos;d be easy enough to locate us at the pride festival.
		Almost any bike you see nearby would probably belong to either someone queer or a queer sympathiser.
		Instead though, I found the tire had worn through; it wasn&apos;t anything malicious.
		I waited too long to replace the tire, so now that the tire wasn&apos;t protecting the inner tube fully, the inner tube&apos;d been damaged.
		I&apos;d considered replacing the tires because they were bald, but opted against it because I didn&apos;t think I needed traction and wanted to save money.
		So much for that.
	</p>
	<p>
		I walked to the screening of a gay movie that was advertised at the festival.
		I&apos;d planned to ride, but my bike was out of commission.
		I still made it with time to spare, but I had no time to find dinner first.
		The movie was probably decent, but I&apos;m not really into movies, so it was boring.
		<em>(Why did I even come to this?
		I <strong>*know*</strong> I don&apos;t like movies.
		The movie including gay themes isn&apos;t magically going to make it entertaining.)</em>
	</p>
	<p>
		After the movie, I tried to ask the person serving drinks if they knew where the nearest department store was, so I could get parts for my bike, but they were having a conversation with one of the viewers.
		After several minutes, I went to the restroom to pass time.
		I got back, waited several more minutes, and gave up.
		Instead, I talked to one of the screeners, and asked them.
		They didn&apos;t seem to know, but they did offer me a lift back to Springfield.
		Honestly, I should&apos;ve declined, but it&apos;d been a long day and I was weak.
		The walk home would&apos;ve taken hours, and I&apos;d chosen to wear shoes today that looked nice, but were very uncomfortable.
		I accepted the ride, thanked them several times, and did my best to move on.
	</p>
	<p>
		Once home, I walked to Fred Meyer for the replacement parts I needed.
		I replaced both tires and the one popped inner tube.
		The tires cost me a chunk of money I didn&apos;t want to spend, but I need my bike.
		It&apos;s my main method of transportation, and without it, my travel distance is rather limited.
		I don&apos;t have the energy to make the repairs tonight though.
		There&apos;ll be time tomorrow.
		I&apos;m nearly done with my current library book, but the library will be closed tomorrow, so I&apos;ll certainly be able to set aside time for bike repairs.
	</p>
	<p>
		My <a href="/a/canary.txt">canary</a> still sings the tune of freedom and transparency.
	</p>
</section>
<section id="library">
	<h2>Library task list</h2>
	<p>
		I knew it was likely I wouldn&apos;t find the route I was looking for, so I gave myself plenty of extra time to make it to the festival.
		I ended up at my destination a little over an hour early, so I found a bench and started reading.
		I&apos;d brought my borrowed book, just in case.
		In a surprise twist, Alton Baker Park is a Willamalane park, so reading for an hour there checked off one of my to-do items.
		I hadn&apos;t planned that though; I had no idea who the park belonged to when I brought the book.
	</p>
	<p>
		I mentioned before the fact that the use of childish language makes the book less fun to read, but it just makes it harder to get into the story.
		Once you&apos;ve been reading it a while, it&apos;s actually a decent story.
		Some of the characters are a bit dim though, such as the Guardian of the Gates.
	</p>
	<blockquote cite="urn:isbn:9781402775468">
		<p>
			&quot;Which road leads to the Wicked Witch of the West?&quot; asked Dorothy.
		</p>
		<p>
			&quot;There is no road,&quot; answered the Guardian of the Gates.
			&quot;No one ever wishes to go that way.&quot;
		</p>
		<p>
			&quot;How, then, are we to find her?&quot; inquired the girl.
		</p>
		<p>
			&quot;That will be easy,&quot; replied the man, &quot;for when she knows you are in the Country of the Winkies she will find you, and make you all her slaves.&quot;
		</p>
		<p>
			&quot;Perhaps not,&quot; said the Scarecrow, &quot;for we mean to destroy her.&quot;
		</p>
		<p>
			&quot;Oh, that is different,&quot; said the Guardian of the Gates.
			&quot;No one has ever destroyed her before, so I naturally thought she would make slaves of you, as she has the rest.
			But take care; for she is wicked and fierce, and may not allow you to destroy her.
			Keep to the West, where the sun sets, and you cannot fail to find her.&quot;
		</p>
	</blockquote>
	<p>
		That last paragraph is the important one.
		I included the others only for context.
		There are a couple obvious problems there though.
		First, of <strong>*course*</strong> no one has destroyed her before!
		That goes without saying.
		If they had, there&apos;d be no witch.
		It&apos;s not like multiple successful quests to destroy the witch would be possible.
		Second, of <strong>*course*</strong> the witch isn&apos;t going to let you destroy her!
		Even if she wasn&apos;t evil, most people have a sense of self-preservation.
	</p>
	<p>
		The section on the witch is surprisingly disappointing if you don&apos;t know what you&apos;re getting yourself into.
		She&apos;s introduced and destroyed in the span of a single chapter.
		She&apos;s <strong>*not*</strong> a main antagonist as the cinematic remake would lead you to believe, and in fact, there doesn&apos;t seem to be a main antagonist at all.
		She&apos;s perfectly fine for what she was written to be, but if you&apos;re looking for an arch-villain, it isn&apos;t her.
		It&apos;s also interesting to note that she&apos;s got only a single eye, but that it can see further than a normal person could with a telescope.
		The story isn&apos;t clear about if she&apos;s missing an eye or if she&apos;s got one in the middle of her forehead, but the illustrations (which may or may not have fallen into the public domain like the story has) in the copy I&apos;m borrowing depict her with an eye patch, implying she used to have a second eye.
	</p>
</section>
		<hr/>
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			Copyright © 2017 Alex Yst;
			You may modify and/or redistribute this document under the terms of the <a rel="license" href="/license/gpl-3.0-standalone.xhtml"><abbr title="GNU&apos;s Not Unix">GNU</abbr> <abbr title="General Public License version Three or later">GPLv3+</abbr></a>.
			If for some reason you would prefer to modify and/or distribute this document under other free copyleft terms, please ask me via email.
			My address is in the source comments near the top of this document.
			This license also applies to embedded content such as images.
			For more information on that, see <a href="/en/a/licensing.xhtml">licensing</a>.
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